Bird Sightings Week 53December 31 (December 30-31 in leap years)

Week 53 is the blip on the end of the year - just a single day
unless it's a leap year. I went down on the 31st
mid-morning, amongst a hoard of dogs, trying to document poor
Week 53. No photos, and nothing dramatic to be seen, but a
couple of highlights:

Greater White-fronted Goose - TWO this time, with
Cacklers and Canadas

Week 53 usually only has a single day in it (since 52*7=364),
but 2016 being a leap year, both December 30 and December 31
fell into Week 53. Alas, even with double the hours, I
couldn't find time to get down to Marymoor. Luckily, Grace
& Ollie Oliver did make it down on the 30th, and it was a very
nice day.

It was frigid but gorgeous today – 23 degrees but crystal clear
skies. Pre-dawn was glorious, with frost, a glow from the east,
a SHORT-EARED OWL cruising the meadows, Venus, Jupiter next to
the half-moon, and the sounds of geese on the lake.

Highlights:

Greater White-fronted Goose 1
in large flock of Cackling Geese
American Wigeon
A couple of flyover flocks, plus 2 birds in slough
Bald Eagle
Osprey-faced juvenile spooked geese often
Cooper’s Hawk
Juvenile in “Pet Cemetery” next to Pea Patch
Short-eared Owl
Very dark – almost called it Long-eared, 7:15
Red-breasted Sapsucker
Two sightings
Merlin Around
7:30 a.m. near East Kiosk
Varied Thrush
Grace had one near the windmill
Spotted Towhee
Maybe 20+
DARK-EYED JUNCO
Huge flocks everywhere – more than 100

For the day, 53 species. For 2015, a very low count of 150
species. Nine more species are on eBird from other birders,
which is closer to a typical year’s count.

I went out solo today. I track the park’s birds by the week of
the year. Poor Week 53 has only a single day each year, except
for leap years when it has two days. So we don’t have very many
surveys for Week 53, and I thought I’d try to add to Week 53’s
totals (and I did – 9 additional species).

I wasn’t expecting it to be a great day, but the weather was
about as perfect as you can get at this time of year – thin
overcast, no wind, temps in the 30’s, no hint of precipitation.
And it was super birdy.

Just as I was heading south from the Dog Area, I heard a
Common Raven calling from above. At first I thought the raven
must be perched atop one of the tall cottonwoods, but finally I
saw it flying very high above the trees. Actually, I thought
there were two ravens, but when I got a look at them with my
binocs, I could see that one of them wasn't a raven - It was a
SNOWY OWL. The owl was slowly cruising southwest, quite high up.
I don't know how long the raven had been flying with it,
harassing it all the time, but it may well have been for miles.
Ravens are much more common in the Snoqualmie Valley than the
Sammamish Valley. Soon after passing over the river, the raven
broke off its pursuit and headed back to the east.

This is the first known report of SNOWY OWL for Marymoor
Park! It brings the Park list to 222, and it was a species that
I was skeptical whether we’d ever get. Snowys around here seem
to prefer being closer to Puget Sound.

I also had a COYOTE west of the weir, and two RIVER OTTERS on
the lake.

For the day, 60 species!

== Michael Hobbs

Common Raven harassing a SNOWY OWL as it flew west over the park.
More (worse) photos below
Rather nice sunrise

Very good-looking Coyote on west side of
the slough, just downstream of the weir

Could someone please count the Pine Siskins for me?

Male Ring-necked Duck just above the
weir

One of at least 5 Red-tailed Hawks

Another shot of the Snowy Owl shows how
it compares in size with the raven

Here, the raven dive-bombs the flapping
Snowy Owl

Female Pileated Woodpecker near the
start of the boardwalk

Horrible photo, but it documents the
male California Quail, our first since June, 2010

Once you finish counting the Pine
Siskins (above), could you please count the Cackling Geese?
This was just one of the flocks in the park.

The Cascades were stunning today

Partially leucistic American Robin - a
"bad hair day" for life

Report for December 31, 2009

Michael is still in
Prague so he missed out on the last Marymoor walk of the year.
Today started out mostly cloudy and chilly, but with no wind. It
gradually clouded over completely, but with structure to the clouds
and the Cascades visible on the horizon. Eventually the cloud
cover became a solid gray stratus and we waited for the rain. The
rain, predicted to start at 10 AM held off and didn’t start until
close to noon. The species diversity was good, although the absolute
numbers of birds seemed to be down. There were a few birds singing
including Bewick's and Marsh Wrens and Red-winged Blackbirds, and
several other species were giving abbreviated versions of songs.

We didn't see
anything spectacular but did have nice sightings of:

Barn Owls

Trumpeter Swans

Common Merganser

Green Heron

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Northern Harrier

hear 3 Virginia
Rails

and get nice looks
at the Northern Shrike.

55 species

All in all, it was
a good day for the last day of December.

Brian H. Bell

Male Common Merganser. Photo by Ollie
Oliver

Common Goldeneye pair near the weir.
Photo by Hugh Jennings

Ollie's shot of the same

Bufflehead at the lake, with at least two
Common Goldeneye. Photo by Lillian Reis

Four female Common Goldeneye, with
Bufflehead. Photo by Lillian Reis

Adult Cooper's Hawk. Photo by
Ollie Oliver

Chestnut-backed Chickadee. Photo by
Ollie Oliver

Definitely not at Marymoor...

As Brian mentioned, we've been in Prague,
Czech Republic. The winter birding here is very slow - I've seen
fewer species in two weeks than the Marymoor crew had in 5 hours on
Thursday. But there are some rather nice birds amongst them,
including this Blue Tit, Parus caeruleus. I haven't managed
any other photos, really, as I only have my wife's snapshot camera, but
I have seen Green Woodpecker, Hawfinch, Gray Wagtail, Bullfinch, Great
Spotted Woodpecker, and more.